WinXP - DOS command prompt runs really slow?

Factual Questions
1

I’m running WinXP on my laptop; Intel P4 2.66 Ghz, 512mb RAM.

For some reason, the command prompt runs really slow when within windows. There’s a noticeable delay when typing at the command line and executing commands. Its very frustrating as I do a lot of command line work (compiling, etc.)

Any ideas?

2

Psst, can you keep a secret?

well, whisper whisper whisper it’s not DOS whisper whisper whisper

I suggest running a different version of DOS, FreeDOS or Dr. DOS come to mind.

3

Try using ‘cmd’ rather than ‘command’ to bring up the DOS prompt.

4

Yeah, I know its just a stupid crappy DOS emulation. This was, in fact, one reason why I waited so long to upgrade.

Okay, “cmd” works faster, but there’s still a noticeable delay.

5

Just some ideas off the top of my head.

Are there background processess chewing up CPU cycles? Determine if there are and try to kill some of them.

Is your hard drive fragmented? Is there a lot of disk activity going on?

6

I’ve noticed this too while running from the command prompt in safe mode. It seems to take longer to scroll as well as inputting commands. I believe it is because XP isn’t based on dos like previous versions of windows (like ForumBot said). Since it’s a fault with XP itself, you might want to try a dos emulator. I’ve heard some good things about Dr. Dos but I’ve never needed to try it. I only ever used Dos for troubleshooting.